Category: Victorian life
Bicycle mania in Cumbria in 1869
The 2019 Tour de France is coming to an end, after 23 gruelling days. The winner on the Champs Elysées on Sunday will have completed around 2,000 miles, over 21 stages, and beaten almost 200 other co... Read More
Middens – and their biggest (?) fan
Middens, for anyone unfamiliar with the word, are heaps (large piles) of domestic waste material – mini rubbish tips that could include human excrement and animal waste, as well as kitchen waste and... Read More
Brunswick Square school Penrith
My post on the young men of Brunswick Square, Penrith, who went off to fight in the First World War brought an inquiry from a reader. “I’m looking for information about a ladies school run at 6 B... Read More
Christmas in Penrith – in 1853
‘Christmas in Penrith’ as an historical search left Cumbrian Characters rather spoiled for choice of material. The year 1853 is totally random – but as good as any other, perhaps. Charle... Read More
Quack medicines and ‘miracle cures’
A further look at the discomforting world of Victorian ‘cures’ for illness In July 1863, a former Carlisle weaver named Thomas Hetherington was fined £5 by magistrates in Hartlepool for selling q... Read More
Scarlet fever in the 1800s
Scarlet fever in the 1800s was a common disease among children – and a deadly one. And sadly, cleanliness and ventilation were either a luxury for poorer households, or maybe not appreciated as impo... Read More
Cumbrian lodging houses – dens of disease
If you imagine Cumbrian lodging houses in the 1800s were in any way better than those in the big industrial cities elsewhere in England, you’d be wrong. Conditions for those forced to live in th... Read More
Ann Little – driven to a terrible act
On July 11, 1881, Ann Little, 45, who couldn’t read or write, was charged with attempting to drown herself and her two youngest children, Annie and Joseph, in the River Caldew, near Hutton Roof. It ... Read More- 2 of 3
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